Choosing a New Computer

Computer shopping has not been simple for several years. We face a balance of buying technology that will remain repair-able and upgrade-able, and when during the operating system life-cycle we are purchasing the new computer.

Timing is everything. The service life for any computer; Apple or PC is 7 years. Then it will no longer be compatible or safe to operate. It will be very easily hacked and will be slow and unreliable. The service life for a Chrome book, phone or tablet is 3 years for the same reason.

Thinking about saving money and buying used or re-furbished? DON'T. Computers have a lifespan that is 7 years from their date of manufacture. You will not get enough of a service life to justify the money.

100% of re-furbished/re-condition/used computers are trouble and failure waiting to happen.The only way to properly re-furbish a computer is by replacing every single part in it. Then they would have to charge double the cost of a new computer to recover what they spent to fix it up. Refurbished computers are a foolish way to part with your money.

First, in my experience Lenovo and Hp laptops, towers and all-in-ones are the most repairable for basic parts failure. Many laptops and all-in-ones are being made with embedded hard drives. In my experience with customers, hard drives fail an average of every 3 years. Make sure the hard drive is replaceable, and that a failed hard drive does not mean a motherboard replacement. If this is important to you, stay away from all Chrome books, Mac Books and all MS Surface series computers.

In towers Make sure the power supply is not embedded. In some desktop towers, the DC output distribution of the power supply is integrated into the motherboard. It is no longer a $35 to $90 power supply replacement when the power supply fails, and this is a very common failure. When an integrated power supply fails, the result is a motherboard replacement. You can buy a new computer for that cost.

With SSD and flash becoming popular for storage, never buy any phone, tablet or computer with a solid stater drive smaller than 256 GB. The size of any drive must be large enough to keep at least 50% of the drive unused for the life of the device (Dock's 50% rule). If they become filled fuller than that, the speed drops dramatically and the risk of complete, permanent data loss rises exponentially.

If it can be avoided, never use flash or a SSD for storage, only for boot and operation. Always use a spinning hard drive for storage. Solid state and flash have a set number of times they can be saved and deleted (P/E cycles). When these cycles are depleted, the drive becomes completely unrecognizable and the data is lost permanently. 

Memory (RAM) must always be at least 8GB for the next few years. A system will never operate fast enough for even the most basic use with less than 8 GB, even with swap space or other virtual solutions.

With those basic parameters, there is one more thing that comes into play: the operating system development and support cycle. Historical development cycles indicate that Windows 10 will be supported until 2022. It was released for the public in 2015.

The lower end of the operating specs for a new computer will be sufficient for the first 4 years of a software support cycle. If you had purchased a computer with 8GB RAM in 2015 it will still be fast enough until Windows 10 is no longer supported (theoretically 2022).

If you bought a 4GB computer that same year, It has been too slow 2018, no matter what you do to clean, defrag, page swap, pre-fetch, etc. We are in the final years of Windows 10 support for computers at the current average specification. If you want 7 superior years of computer operation, your new computer should be purchased with 16 GB RAM. This will get you halfway through the support cycle of the next-generation of Windows software (theoretically 2025).

In a nutshell, if you buy equipment at the time a new system is released, the amount of RAM listed in the system requirements will be enough for reliable, fast computer operation until the next operating system is released (7 years). If you buy equipment in the middle of the software support cycle, double the amount of RAM and the computer will run reliably and fast for 7 years.

For Macs, double the amount of RAM listed in the system requirements for the current operating system and the computer will operate reliably and fast for 7 years from its date of manufacture. For Chrome books, place the computer back onto the shelf and buy a Mac or a pc.

If you would like help choosing your next computer, call The Dock! ~ 512.648.1506

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